Inside Health

LETTERS; Cash For Kidneys?

Published: December 29, 2009

To the Editor:

''A 'Gift of Life' With Money Attached'' (Essay, Dec. 22) is right on point. But how about the ideas for getting more people on the donor list with lifetime incentives like a free driver's license or vouchers for the cost of cremation upon one's death?

B. F. Skinner taught pigeons to play Ping-Pong with pellets; surely we can modify human behavior to save lives as donors. If it were my child waiting for an organ, I would be happy to pay into the ''fund for free driver's licenses.''

Tom Byrne
Coral Gables, Fla.

To the Editor:

The legalized selling of kidneys and other organs and body parts would take advantage of the poor, the unemployed, the less educated and/or those in economic distress.

Instead of remunerating donors, why not have a safety net consisting of full employment with a living wage and universal health care? Then we would know the giving of a kidney or any body part was done without coercion or desperation but truly for altruism.